Great Falls tribune. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1885-1890, 1887-02-19
FEB. 10, 1887.
s.MUsCI.''
A TALL. ABOUT NOISES.

Written fer The Trt5uae::
"The tiny moses, whose silken vcrdure
clothes
The time-worn rock. and whose bright
capsules rise
Like fairy urns on stalks of golden sheen.
Demands our admiration and our praise,
AS much as cedar kissing the blae sky,
Or krubal's giant flower. God made tsem
all;
And what He deigns to make, should ne'er
be deem'd
Unworthy Of our study and our love"
The poet says much that is true in The
lines above. All of our readers may not
understand the reference to "hrubal's
giant flower 1t is the blossom Of 4 huge
tropical parasitic plant infesting the trunks
of the gigantic trees of those regions, and
increditable as it may appear, this .@4t-er Ss
three feet IN dtGnaetef. a little moss seems
very humble when mentioned III the same
breath with such an enormous flower, and,
yet, no matter how lowly 4 plant may be.
it was created by the same great Power
that called us into being; for that reason,
if for no other. it should not be beneath
our notice.
The MOSES belong to the Gryptoymta-
a word compounded of two Greek words
meaning, to conceal and auptua7s. This
name is applied to the great division to
-l:.l xta -a,.o ~. -,Fa.r,I J,n,a,,-as al
plants belonging to it are wholly devoid Of
true flowers and seed. They all propagate
by means of spores and correlated bodies,
which, sometimes, are quite evident, but
very often are not found Al all, So the
scientific name is very applicable.
Noses have two kinds Of qualification.
The first is the most conspicuous, contain
ing the spores or seeds il a receptacle
called an urn. The second kind is not So
conspicuous, 1t is usually minute and Of
ten wanting entirely. 1t consists Of cylin-
drical bodies clustered in the axis Of the
leaves. These bodies are supposed to ans
wer the same purpose as the stamens III
Towering plants and may occur on the
same plants with the urns or grow on diff
ferent individuals. They open at their
points ~irregularly and discharge q more
or less sticky, granular substance, suppos-
ed by ON to answer the same purpose as
pollen. viz.-the fertilization Of the young
seeds.
The urn is, however, the mostimportant
organ Of qualification and receives more
particular attention than the other organs
of the plant. Its presence adds greatly
and sometimes wholly, to the beauty of
some moses. 1t is usually borne at the
summit Of the slender stalks which gener-
ally arise either from the end or the side
of a branch. but there are numerous eXcep-
lions to this rule. Its shape varies as
much as its position. Sometimes it is
round and almost globular, OF it may be
eggshapea, or four-sided, and Sc on. Its
color likewise varies with the species to
which it belongs. 1t may be all shades Of
green, red, or brown, and varying all the
May rum uiits NHlbs W Jst DitS@. 5o.iS-
times it is very small and inconspicuous,
and again it is so large in proportion to the
rest of the plant that, at a first glance, n
would notice nothing else.
While the urn is young, that is, before
the little spores within are fully developed
it is more or less completely enveloped by
a hood, called a geil; when the spores are
nearly ripe this veil falls off, lin some
spec.es it falls off while the urns are quite
youns.) revealing the naked urn surmount-
ed. and closed by a lid, There are a few
species that have no lid and when the
spores are fully ripe the lids drop off and
the spores are discharged. When the Id
is removed we can examine the mouth OF
the urn. Important generic descriptions
are founded upon its character. 1t is usu-
ally surrounded by a fringe, single or
double, but some species are destitute of
this appendage. The individual parts of
this fringe are called teeth, and the num-
Der of teeth in a fringe is often employed
bv botanists in describing the essential